COP17 in Armenia: World Nature Conference gets underway with major challenges ahead

Around a third of the world’s land and marine areas are to be effectively protected by 2030. Discussions on how this is to be achieved will begin today at the COP17 World Nature Conference in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia. By Stephan Hübner, HR It is one of the 23 targets of the Global Biodiversity Agreement, which was agreed upon four years ago by the nearly 200 parties to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity: by 2030, around a third of the Earth’s surface is to be under protection. However, it is not certain whether this can be achieved. The COP17 World Nature Conference, which begins today in Armenia’s capital, Yerevan, is therefore dominated by the question: what needs to happen to ensure that the protection of biodiversity finally progresses more quickly and successfully? Progress is slow Federal Environment Minister Carsten Schneider is due to fly to Yerevan. The SPD politician intends to take part in the negotiations during the second week of the conference. He wants to champion, not least, international cooperation on the protection of biodiversity. He already stated this last Friday in the Bundestag. Germany will step up international cooperation, he said there. “Nature, in particular, does not stop at national borders; it needs our international cooperation.” The German government recently pledged 100 million dollars for African protected areas and mobilised a further 200 million from foundations. At the same time, the German government intends to link species conservation and climate protection more closely. However, German funding for biodiversity has recently fallen. And globally, too, nature conservation is progressing too slowly, according to Astrid Schomaker, head of the UN Biodiversity Secretariat. Progress has varied across individual targets, she explained. And: “It is not yet happening at the pace and on the scale required to achieve the 2030 targets.” Some species have barely been taken into account so far The slow implementation is particularly evident where economic interests are at stake. There are also shortcomings when it comes to protecting areas: even if all commitments were met, 30 per cent of land and marine areas would not be under protection by 2030. Furthermore, some organisms have so far been largely overlooked – fungi, for example. But that is set to change at COP17. A new conservation strategy is to be presented, according to mycologist Meike Piepenbring from the University of Frankfurt am Main. The fact that fungi have not been given sufficient attention to date is demonstrated, according to Piepenbring, by the fact that only around one per cent of fungi are assessed on the so-called Red List, which monitors endangered animal and plant species. Yet fungi are indispensable for soils, nutrient cycles and the growth of many plants. More funding is needed. However, for such conservation strategies to be implemented, money is required. And this is in short supply everywhere. By 2030, at least 200 billion dollars a year is to be mobilised for global nature conservation. UN Secretary-General António Guterres is therefore calling on states to honour their aid pledges and phase out subsidies that harm nature. The Cali Fund illustrates just how difficult it is to secure new sources of funding: companies are expected to pay voluntarily for the use of genetic data from nature. By early October, only $6,000 had been recorded; since then, just one further payment has been made. Individual countries could block progress Yerevan is now expected to provide a roadmap for faster nature conservation. It remains to be seen whether the states will agree on this. Biodiversity researcher Yves Zinngrebe from the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research emphasises that even a single country or a small group of countries could halt the entire process – “and with it, the momentum that is building globally.” This is because decisions at the World Nature Conference are taken by consensus. Whether concrete measures are agreed in Armenia or whether political deadlocks prevent progress will therefore also serve as a test of international cooperation.